dmseay

saw you out on the streets…sayin’it’d been a year since a drink was taken…thin…eyes gone…asking for cigarettes…i quit…

They’re tearin’ down the old mission and building another, a mumble…somewhat a declaration, And puttin’ in a liquor-store right across the damn street…can you imagine…big bold letters…Coming Soon…Belmont Liquors…mother-fuckers..

and i told ya’ i was never a fan…didn’t care for the way business was done at the shelter…biggest racket in-town…all in the name of Jesus…dollar matching dollar…

old beat-up Fords drove past…Dodges too…skinny men askin’ for dollars and dimes…a fix was needed…,could ya’ help-out an old friend, you asked, I’m startin’to shake…diabetes ya’ know…been in the hospital so many times…lost track…

my head twisted…payday hadn’t come…you walked-onto the next guy…and the guy after that…lookin’ for a low to no interest loan…whatever ya’ got…anything’ll do…

and i did not judge…my prayers were met…grace and luck…grace and luck…

not to care what foolishness brings… stares…gestures of minions being led to offices…car washes…buffet tables…barstools…church pews…dentist chairs…wisdom pulled…thrown away with rubber gloves and antiseptics…

seated on a park bench…chatting-away with myself…occasional cries…reading from a book by Rilke…a poem of autumn’s mystery…damn that German…

the phone has not rung…there are no messages… noise is inside…not my head…it is a soul that stirs… aches…longs to be heard…

by you…by you…

kids wade in fountain waters…poisoned…pennies and dimes among candy-bar wrappers and broken bottles…they laugh…and laugh…and laugh as young mom’s with tattoos smoke cigarettes and drink Dew…looking for a man…always looking for a man…

deals are cut before me…Spice bought and sold by ghosts who died long ago…always had one foot in the grave…the other too…only a matter of time ’til completely buried…put in-ground by pushers…peddlers…parents…public institutions…never fitting-in…not in this American fable…a god hears your cry…

soon skies will darken and the lemmings will safely walk through doors to homes purchased with blood and bills…second mortgages…money leant…apple pies baked…suburban dreams of Florida and Arizona nesting when all is said and done…birds flying south as birds always do…safely landing…always safe…

and i will still be on this park bench…chatting-away and reading Rilke…

this is the business we have chosen…

*thanks to Francis Ford Coppola and Mario Puzo…

i write lines…dialogue overheard in diners between old Jews and young Turks…bars where working class heroes down shots to forget about an easier life they never had…in churches with Mexicans sending prayers to a god who might be listening(the jury’s still out)….

in bed with a page lit of blue…these thoughts are scribed… prejudices…classes divided…guys with the upper-hand…never reaching down…whores who walk Grand Avenue…always looking to score…as they do in New York…Los Angeles..St.Louis…a habit is a habit is a habit and that ain’t goin’ away…young girls turned into skeletons by the age of 23…

and pastors that punish in homeless shelters…you don’t worship Christ…no bed for you…soup-lines in the cold with bellies in-need of a fill…a buttered roll will do…a cup of joe…

psych-wards in New Haven…Iowa…New York…Kentucky…St. Louis…and all points east…the mentally-ill… criminally insane…a depressed divorcee…hyper-active kids…junkies…crackheads…speed-freaks…all tossed in the same tub…somewhat scrubbed and sent back out…to start all over again…as easy as 1..2..3..keep turnin’ beds…turnin’beds…

i write about the America of now and the one that never was…myths are to be revealed…lessons from a past not so shining… just keeps on fading into night…where wolves howl on prairies and cops kill blacks and blacks kill cops and nothing is learned…nothing is taught…a guessing-game gone awry…with winners and losers…nothing in-between…chalk it up as a loss…

so now turn in your hymnal to page 118…an all-time favorite of the Bush family…Obama…the Clintons…Nixon…the unofficial anthem of a country found upon religious freedoms…where all men are created equal…Amazing Grace…Amazing grace…how sweet the sound…that saved…

you’ll never save this wretch…the deal is done…i will write… that is my salvation…

let’s park in the dark by a train track with a bottle of wine and an armrest between us…

away from this…

into night…

no questions asked…

just two people…

no-one needs to know…

you know what broads do…

yes…yes…

they fuck things up…fuck things up…

right…yes…

and they’re real good at it…a perfected craft…

uh huh..

like a Texas twister they come into town and rip everything apart…this is not good…not good…

no…not at all…

right…

sure…

and what do we do about this…this plague….this March upon Paris…

what…

nothing….not a fuckin’ thing….

correct…

because we can’t…it is not done…this fear of being alone…nothing beside you…no teat to suck-on…

this…this…

is what…what…

insensitive….

insensitive….

yes…if you wanna get laid yous have to tap into your feminine side…

…….  …… ….. pass the salt….

1. quit high school…
2. lived everywhere…town to town
3. different jobs…occupations…
4. two suicide attempts…
5. two marriages…
6. diagnosed bipolar…
7. lived in historic houses…
8. slept under old willows in Central Park…
9. homeless for 6 years…New York…Vermont…Montreal…Philly…a Dodge Avenger…
10. four friends killed…senseless..
11. dismissed by family…
12. old allies now gone…
13. college degree…
14. a writer by trade…
15. 30 visits to psych-wards throughout the U.S. …
16. on meds…off meds…
17. heartbreaks and hangovers…
18. mom died…dad’s gone crazy…
19. just put it on the page…after sleepless nights….
20. And…i’m still alive…beat that…

and a child was born unto her…this whore of Gotham…under an expressway as semis drove above and families passed-on en-route to all points south…vacations awaiting…condo packages purchased…

the cord was cut with a rusty blade found in a garbage can outside a tavern where old men drank away mistakes from the past along with current woes…shot after shot after shot..chased by beer after beer…wives waited…supper got cold..

the whore did not yell…nor kick…or scream out in pain…a bottle of brandy close-by…passed back and forth…dark eyes closed tight as a boyfriend breathed along…in and out in and out…a rhythm…a beat…keep goin’ honey…

bums walked past…some paused…looking-on at the miracle of birth…naked…truth…simplicity…making man want for love…a caring hand to hold…

newspapers gathered…The Post…Daily News…El Diario…make-shift sponges soaking-up spilled blood…tears wiped away…covering the whore and child…a baby boy she would name Moses…warmth…warmth…

yet…like a bank-heist at midnight…Moses was taken from a sleeping mother…sold to the highest bidder…a couple of grand given to a father in need of a fix…in need of a fix…turning the child into junk shot-up in back alleys…bathroom stalls…abandoned homes…leaving the whore for a greater love…she could never give him this…

on a subway at 3…lying sideways shaking… cold sweat ran down a black forehead…brown teeth chattered…mumbling, I’m sorry…so sorry…forgive me…please lord…forgive me…

shhh…hush now,said the passenger standing above…holding a rail as the train rattled through the night…,shhhh…you are forgiven my child…you are forgiven…you are loved…

the passenger leaned-down on this broken soul…holding…rocking…holding…rocking with crying…a wide-open mouth…silent wails as beggars begged…and night-hawks flew…

shhh my child…shhh…you are forgiven…you are forgiven…

so you got this bowl of fruits in front of ya’…

yea…

cantaloupe…honeydew…strawberries…watermelon..

sure…

and you wanna save the best for last…the one you’ll remember right…

uh huh..

you eat around this last piece of watermelon the whole time…waiting…just waiting for it to be the last bite…you wanna remember the best…

but…what if you like honeydew…

this book-bag carries belongings from along the way…various places…reminders…

Simic…Whitman…Kerouac…add weight to this journey…passages and cups of coffee in Montreal…New York…Philly…Vermont upon autumn’s turn…ritual…thankful…

and miles driven…hiked…a tour of riches for the soul…never asking why…awaiting the next day…perhaps hour to unfold…revealing what…what…

all that there is at 48…a book-bag filled with Simic…Whitman…Kerouac…

i’ve lost nothing….

this…what is this…past…promises…oaths…never taken seriously…kids playing house…

yes…these lies upon lies…misrepresentations…cover-ups…leading to this…this…

you were embarrassed…a mate in search of soul…not money nor materials…power or position…these deals we make…in the name of what…

never impressed with sales figures…prizes or dividends…a bottom-line met… Meister Eckhart kept score…i chose his words…not your’s…

and i am at peace in not being at peace…to question…seek truth…looking for wisdom in old books…poems and prose…streets…ravines…forests… taverns across a land that chose commerce and real-estate…commerce and real-estate…

yet Whitman still walks among the dead…Melville fights the good fight…the noble battle…and Henry Miller dances away while Kerouac prays…they keep me alive…i’m not hungry…

so i say goodbye to you and America…home of the free and the not-so-often brave…so-long to this air-conditioned nightmare built upon sand…a beach closed in the winter-time…

it was never in the cards…never was…and that is O.K. …that is O.K. …

*a thanks to Joe Jackson and Henry Miller*